


you make it easy

by thankyouforexisting



Series: you light the spark [1]
Category: Dark Artifices Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: 15 year olds, Angst, Autism, Cute, First Dates, First Kiss (kind of), Fluff, Fluffy, Grieving, Grounding oneself, I love ty so fucking much, Ice Cream, Insomnia, LA, Love, M/M, Mourning, Not everyone is neurotypical and Kit tries to be supportive, Panic Attacks, Right After Lady Midnight, The Institute - Freeform, Understanding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-04
Updated: 2016-04-04
Packaged: 2018-05-31 07:06:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6460615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thankyouforexisting/pseuds/thankyouforexisting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kit feels lost without the dark-haired shadowhunter beside him (and when had <i>that</i><br/>happened, that he’d gotten used to his steady presence? He hasn’t even been here for a whole day!), but the girl bites her lip, “I was just joking,” she hesitates, and then turns a beaming smile at Kit, “I’m Livvy, Ty’s twin sister.” She goes on pointing around the table, “And those are Tavvy,” the smallest of them all, a quiet boy who seems to be clinging to - “Dru,” -a short girl who’s hugging him, “and that’s Perfect Diego, who’s a Centurion.”</p>
<p>‘Perfect Diego’ sighs, “Please, I beg you all, stop calling me that.”</p>
<p>Livvy laughs, “Right! Anyway, Kit, you’re welcome to sit down wherever you want and have breakfast; you’re one of us, now.”</p>
<p>“I’m not a Shadowhunter,” he grunts, but quietly, “I just want to eat.”</p>
<p>“Don’t we all,” Julian agrees easily.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you make it easy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TabithaAstroradical](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TabithaAstroradical/gifts).



> so...i just read Lady Midnight. HOLY FUCK DO I SHIP KITTY ITS MY NEW OTP I LOVE THEM. Regarding Ty being somewhere in the autistic spectrum, I've done some research on the subject before, and my amazing bro helped me a lot! They're awesome, and this fic is dedicated to them, for being so great!
> 
> Title from the same song as the lyrics above, "1, 2, 3, 4" by Plain White T's.

 

__Give me more loving than I've ever had  
Make it all better when I'm feeling sad  
Tell me I'm special even when I know I'm not  
Make it feel good when it hurts so bad  
Barely get mad  
I'm so glad I found you  
I love being around you  
You make it easy

\- 1, 2, 3, 4 , Plain White T's

"[Kit] thought,  _How beautiful_." 

-Lady Midnight, Cassandra Clare

* * *

When Kit opens his door, after lying down on a strange bed, the sheets smelling like cheap supermarket detergent, the kind that you only buy if you’re getting the guest room ready, after sneezing without being able to stop because there’s dust gathering in every corner, after trembling, hands shaking, every second of his father’s death imprinted on his eyelids, there’s that  _ boy, _ the one who held a knife to him and then said it wasn’t personal, sitting on the floor, a book on his lap. He startles slightly, turning to look at Kit..

 

He’s been leaning on the door, Kit realizes, possibly for hours, because it’s dark outside now, he can see out from the windows that are in the hallway. The Shadowhunters won’t even leave him  _ alone _ , as if they’re making sure he can’t escape the looming walls of the LA Institute. It makes him want to scream, bite and kick and tear this boy apart, but he remembers the feel of cold, shimmering metal on his throat, and he settles for righteous fury.

 

Kit crosses his arms and spits out, “I don’t need to be  _ watched _ like an animal,  _ Shadowhunter _ . I’ve got no place to go, so you can just go back to your stupid, pretentious routines and  _ get out _ .”

 

The Shadowhunter ignores him, sighing softly as he stands up. He’s taller than Kit, by a few inches, barely nothing, really, but it makes him feel even smaller, even  _ weaker _ , like these angelic smartasses can do whatever they want with him ( _ like those things did with his father _ ). He also can’t help thinking again how  _ beautiful _ he is, the way his cheekbones make his face look slim and delicate, how his t-shirt seems to fit him incredibly well, and the intriguing grey in his eyes adorned by lush black lashes. The dark-haired boy cocks his head, looking at something over Kit’s shoulder (though he wonders what, since the walls are completely bare except for a painting of an ugly guy with those  _ things _ tattooed all over his arms), and asks, “What are you doing?”

 

Kit grit his teeth, “Nothing,” and slams the door in the dude’s face.

 

…

 

“I assume you’re looking for food, and I am usually right,” Mister I-can’t-take-a-hint says when Kit dares to peek outside his bedroom, after trying to quiet his indignant stomach. He’s been hungry for a few hours now, and it was a lost cause. He’d really thought the annoying kid had left.

 

“Oh, fuck off,” Kit snaps, flushing in embarrassment, “Everyone needs to eat, okay? Now, get out of my way; I’ll find the kitchen by myself.”

 

“But that’s a waste of time,” the Shadowhunter retorts, looking honestly puzzled by his anger, which only makes Kit want to rip his head off more, “I can easily take you to it, and it’ll be more efficient for both of us.”

 

“You didn’t seem the type to be worried about time management, since apparently you’ve been stalking my room for the past five hours or so,” Kit says, raising his eyebrows, but only sighs exaggeratedly when the Shadowhunter boy follows him as he steps out of the awful room. 

 

The guy moves gracefully and effortlessly until he falls into step with Kit, letting the hand holding the book  fall to his side, and subtly leads the way, humming under his breath. There’s a pair of headphones on his neck, the cord slipping under his black t-shirt, presumably to some device, because it’s not connected to the book, and there doesn’t seem to be an mp3 in his pocket and Kit-Kit has  _ really _ got to stop staring at the guy’s chest for so long.

 

“Why do you hate Shadowhunters so much?” the boy asks, sounding genuinely curious, as if he truly doesn’t think people who kidnap Sighted kids, who carry around swords and blackmail people, who think they’re better than everyone, who call you  _ mundane _ , as if you’re boring, unimportant, like you’re  _ inferior _ , could be anything but adored.

 

“Why do you  _ think _ ?” Kit bites, quickening his step and lengthening his stride so he can get the hell out of there, so he doesn’t have to deal with ignorant little rich boys who don’t know what they’re talking about.

 

“Shadowhunters answered your call for help,” the dude reminds him, as if he could ever forget.

 

His mind flashes, memories of his father’s body being torn apart, eaten and destroyed, brutalized while he could just  _ shake _ , feeling less than useless, just trying to save himself ( _ selfish, selfish, coward _ ), and he wants to curl up in a ball and hide, forget the sound of any human voice, bury his grief underneath starlight. It will always be his most regretted moment, he thinks, the one he’ll go back to over and over again, he’ll chip at his self-confidence until it’s gone, until he imagines a thousand ways he could’ve saved his father, and then he’ll never let it happen again.

 

“They got there too late,” he murmurs, bitter but knowing it isn’t their fault, for once, “And it didn’t make a difference.”

 

“It  _ did _ make a difference,” the Shadowhunter hisses, and there’s more passion in his voice that Kit’s heard before. He turns to him, confused, and the boy swallows, not meeting his eyes, and repeats, a little more evenly, “We got  _ you _ out.”

 

For some reason, that makes Kit’s heart stumble in his steady beating, and he flushes, not sure whether he’s pleased that the graceful teenager who looked at him with strangely captivating focus, his grey eyes  _ burning _ in his dark basement, thinks he’s worth saving, or pissed off because the kid who almost killed him is trying to trick him by being nice.

 

“Yeah, well, I’m not staying here, anyway,” he mutters, defensive, although he doesn’t know why, “Take me to the kitchens, then.”

 

The boy complies, but the corners of his lips are curled upwards, as if he thinks Kit’s being amusing, which should irritate him, but somehow it doesn’t. Without a word, they finally get to a huge, dark room that’s somewhere on the Institute’s first floor. The Shadowhunter flicks the light switch on, and suddenly all Kit can see is the amazing, incredible,  _ wonderful _ fridge, the small buzzing sound it’s making. His mouth waters, but he’s determined not to lunge for the food in front of this aristocratic guy, who looks as if he uses different types of cutlery for every meal, with the way he moves, as if he’s always dancing (truly ridiculous) and those curls, much too nice to be using regular conditioner, like the one Kit has ( _ had _ ).

 

( _ Don’t think about his hair, either _ , Kit reminds himself.)

 

So, for a while, they just stand there. 

 

“Aren’t you going to get me any food?” Kit caves after a few minutes, biting his lower lip, “Since I’m your  _ guest _ , and all.”

 

“I never said you were our guest,” the Shadowhunter smiles then, his hands going to his headphones, as if it’s automatic, checking for them, and Kit’s eyes track the movement, curious, “You  _ did _ just choose one of our bedrooms and make it your own. I’d say you’re here for the long run, and you’re not even paying rent like Watson did.”

 

Kit frowns, not sure what detective novels have to do with anything, “Watson? You’re one of those Sherlock Holmes geeks, aren’t you?”

 

The Shadowhunter’s head snaps up, grey eyes wide, and he stares at Kit, like he’d done the first time they met (which casually happened to be when the guy was threatening to slit his throat), just for a few seconds, “You know Arthur Conan Doyle? Have you read the books?  I’ve got everything in my room, the whole collection, it’s incredible -”

 

Despite himself, Kit finds that he’s resisting a fond smile. It’s not often guys his age let themselves get excited about anything, especially stuff like books. But with this Shadowhunter...it makes the dude’s face light up, hands going up to grasp at his headphones again (it’s for reassurance, Kit realizes, to hold onto something), and he seems to  _ glow _ , like when he was wearing that awfully tight ( _ fuck _ ) fighting gear, coming alive with the dagger in his hand, looking powerful and devastating.

 

“I’ve never actually read the books,” Kit admits, slightly ashamed now that he sees someone so excited over that old collectiong he’s always just dismissed as borin, “But everybody’s heard of Sherlock Holmes, he’s famous.”

 

“He’s  _ famous _ ?” the Shadowhunter gapes, and he sounds thrilled, glancing around the room as if he’s about to spring and reach the nearest Sherlock Holmes Fan Club to screech like a fangirl, but then Kit’s stomach rumbles.

 

He blushes, because the guy stops talking, shutting his mouth.  He frowns, and tilts his head to look at Kit, “You’re starving.”

 

“Yeah,  _ so _ ?” he crosses his arms over his chest, refusing to seem like a kid, “I haven’t eaten in a few hours; it happens to us regular humans.”

 

The Shadowhunter flinches as if he’s been struck, lips tightening, hands curling into fists, all traces of amusement leaving his expression, which he then smoothes over quickly, “Sit. I’ll bring you food.”

 

He obeys. Somehow, Kit gets the feeling that he just screwed up, big time. But, he reminds himself, it’s not his fault those stuck-up jerks think they’re better than him, and they should at least handle being told to their face what other people think of them. 

 

But the boy had been so gentle, so patient. 

 

He sets his book on the table with a small noise, back tense as he turns away from Kit, jaw locked tight, and opens the fridge. He doesn’t say anything, and he barely makes any sound when he’s moving, seeming to glide, light and surefooted. He’d been quiet before, but Kit feels that was different, it was comfortable, and it wasn’t heavy, like now,  how he feels like there’s something crushing his chest and making it harder for him to breathe.

 

“You’re going to have to deal with it, Shadowhunter,” he snaps, because he hates feeling guilty over something he  _ knows _ isn’t his fault, “If you go around being all amazing and holier-than-thou then someone’s eventually gonna call you out on your bullshit.”

 

Somehow, that makes the boy relax, and he’s even looking like Kit just stepped on his toe rather than like he’d killed his kittens, when he comes and sits in front of him, putting a plate of heated up pasta on the table, along with a fork. Kit’s eyes zero on the food immediately; it looks delicious, hot and just ready to eat, and he starts shoveling spaghetti into his mouth as fast as he can. He probably looks crazy, but he’s  _ starving _ .

 

“Tiberius,” the guy says suddenly, startling Kit and making him look up, fork halfway up to his mouth. A spaghetto falls down, and the Shadowhunter smiles faintly.

 

Kit frowns, “Tiberius? Is that like a weird curse word or something? It kinda sounds like something you take when you’ve got the flu,” he tries for an advertiser’s voice, knowing he sounds horrible but still determined to carry on the stupid joke,“‘Tiberius Optimus, clears your lungs right up.’”

 

The Shadowhunter rolls his eyes, touching his headphones again, “My name. I’m not called ‘Shadowhunter’. That’s what Tiberius is for, although I’m glad it’s a source of entertainment for you. I’ll be sure to tell Drusilla; she’s always complaining about how lucky I am.”

 

Kit flushes, rubbing the back of his neck with his fork-free hand, refusing to spend any time more than necessary  _ not _ eating, “I, um, sorry. To be honest, it  _ is _ a weird name to have.”

 

Tiberius raises his dark, polished ( _ polished? How is that an adjective that applies to eyebrows? _ ) eyebrows, “My family calls me Ty, if that is ‘less weird’ for you.”

 

Something flashes in his eyes, as if he’s saying,  _ go ahead, call me Ty, and see how clearly  _ you _ ’re not part of my family, how easily I can reject you _ . It makes him ache more than it should.

 

Kit grumbles, muttering something about poor naming choices, and settles for devouring the spaghetti with renewed vigour, but, out of the corner of his eyes, he can see Tiberius smiling softly.

 

It makes him want to smile  back.

 

…

 

The next day, when he hears the knock on his door after he wakes up, he knows who it is even before he opens it, trying for an annoyed expression.

 

At the sight of Tiberius’s fakely nonchalant expression, headphones resting comfortably on his shoulders, it vanishes, and he can only manage not to beam, so sure that their easy interactions would be stripped away once it was morning.

 

“Hey,” he says, because he’s original like that.

 

The shadowhunter blinks, “Hello. Would you like to join us for breakfast? Julian’s making eggs, in celebration. We’re alive, after all,” he frowns, “Although, he  _ does _ seem a bit angry.”

 

_ We’re alive, after all _ . Kit closes his eyes. There’s someone who  _ isn’t _ alive, who he saw die with his own two eyes, who’s probably not even going to get a funeral, because those monsters  _ ate _ him-

 

“Are you okay?” Tiberius voice snaps him out of his thoughts, and he sounds alarmed. Almost abstractly, he realizes he’d been breathing hard, hands hanging onto the door for dear life, knuckles white with strain. The boy’s rich, pale ( _ stop it _ ) lips are curled unhappily, and his own hands are grabbing the headphones for dear life.  _ He’s panicking _ , Kit notes, and swallows.

 

_ His father, shaking his head fondly and putting his hand out, “Now, Kit, give me your phone.” _

 

_ “But  _ dad _ ,” he complained, trying to delay it for just a little longer, “I won’t be able to call you if something happens then!” _

 

_ “You have your other phone, and don’t think I don’t know it _ ,”  _ John Rook grinned, eyes crinkling _ .

 

“Yeah,” Kit croaks, and his voice sounds rough even to his own ears, “Yeah, I’m okay. Let’s go down, to meet all the amazing shadowhunters. I’m  _ so _ excited.”

 

He tries not to think about how that tall woman had told him he was a shadowhunter as well. She  _ had _ to be wrong, but then...he’d opened the Institute door, hadn’t he?

 

Tiberius seems to accept that, sarcastic as he might have been,and his arms seem to lose some of their tension, still looking uneasy but a bit more grounded. He doesn’t smile, but he’s not miserable, either, “To the kitchens, then.”

 

The kitchens are already flurrying with activity; Kit sees the older guy, the Mexican god, helping the shadowhunter in charge of the cooking, who seems stressed, teeth gritted, movements rigid. The blond girl, Emma Carstairs, is nowhere in sight, and neither is the dude with the weird as fuck eyes.

 

Tiberius sighs almost imperceptibly, as if preparing himself  for a fight, and steps into the room, wincing at the noise, and shaking his head in acknowledgement at the stressed dude, “Julian, I brought Kit.”

 

So  _ that’ _ s Emma’s  _ parabatai _ , or whatever they’re called. Julian smiles tiredly at Tiberius, and then at Kit, “Hello, Kit. Did you sleep alright?”

 

It sounds very much like something a father would say, even if Kit’s dad in particular had never said it, and it makes him stiffen, instinctively moving closer to Tiberius, who’s safe, who has comforting grey eyes instead of blue, and who doesn’t ask stupid questions.

 

_ Of course _ he hasn’t slept alright. He saw his  _ father _ get murdered. How is someone supposed to close their eyes and rest after that? Kit succumbed when the sun was already up, and maybe slept fitfully for an hour or two, but he has definitely  _ not _ slept alright.

 

“Yes,” he mutters, because he won’t say that when he can see there’s children happily chatting at the table, looking fresh and  _ happy _ , “Sure.”

 

“Ty!” a brunette exclaims, quickly putting a hand on Tiberius’s shoulder, familiar and easy, and Kit wonders, a little panicked for some reason,  _ is she his girlfriend? _ , “Stop stalking Kit, it’s rude!”

 

Tiberius scrunches up his nose, “Well, he hasn’t  _ said _ so,” he rubs at his temples, and Kit realizes he must be exhausted. He’d gone to bed even after Kit had, and he’s pretty sure they’d fought before getting to the Institute, “Now, I’ll let  _ you _ handle him if you think you’re such an expert.”

 

The boy puts on his headphones and sits next to a happy teenager with the same blue eyes and brown hair as most of the people in the kitchens, grabbing a plate with scrambled eyes and making a face at them.

 

Kit feels lost without the dark-haired shadowhunter beside him (and when had  _ that _ happened, that he’d gotten used to his steady presence? He hasn’t even been here for a whole day!), but the girl bites her lip, “I was just joking,” she hesitates, and then turns a beaming smile at Kit, “I’m Livvy, Ty’s twin sister.” She goes on pointing around the table, “And those are Tavvy,” the smallest of them all, a quiet boy who seems to be clinging to - “Dru,” -a short girl who’s hugging him, “and that’s Perfect Diego, who’s a Centurion.”

 

‘Perfect Diego’ sighs, “Please, I beg you all, stop calling me that.”

 

Livvy laughs, “Right! Anyway, Kit, you’re welcome to sit down wherever you want and have breakfast; you’re one of us, now.”

 

“I’m not a Shadowhunter,” he grunts, but quietly, “I just want to eat.”

 

“Don’t we all,” Julian agrees easily, still looking tired, dark circles under his eyes, leaving the things in the sink and sitting on the table as well, “So, join us, Kit.”

 

He hesitates, looking over to where Tiberius is sitting, eyes fixed on his food, moving it around with his fork, and then he sees the boy nod, without acknowledging in any other way that he knows what Kit means. Even so, he quickly makes his way to the spot beside him and gets as much food as he dares, sipping orange juice almost happily. 

 

After a while, when Tavvy has spilled some juice on himself and Julian’s grumbling as he gets Dru a wet towel to clean him up, when Cristina, the beautiful Mexican girl whose eyes stray towards Perfect Diego seemingly involuntarily, comes in and cheerfully greets Kit, he sees Ty smiling, just slightly, headphones still on.

 

Their feet are pointed at each other, Kit realizes, and doesn’t say anything about it.

 

…

 

Life at the Institute isn’t as exciting and terrifying as his dad made it sound.

 

For starters, there’s a lot of studying, with an imposing black woman who’s called Diana and raises her eyebrow anytime Kit (subtly) groans at the history lessons. She teaches Kit the truth about Shadowhunters, even if sometimes he still feels reluctant and contrary, doubting. Diana tells him the truth about what happened in the War, and explains why his father made them sound worse than they seem (it takes her a long time to do that; the first time, he’d stormed out of the room and cried for the whole day), and admits that the Clave  _ is _ flawed, which is human enough to make Kit like her.

 

The others train with some weapon or another, but when Emma takes him to the weapons room, smiling in a way that is probably supposed to be reassuring but actually looks kind of demented, he doesn’t really feel like any of them are his thing. So the blond shadowhunter lets him be, most likely because she looks pale and worn-out herself. She used to smile more, Kit remembers.

 

He still refuses to talk to Jace Herondale, even though Diana and Julian keep insisting, pleading, even begging him to just write a letter, because he might be prepared to accept one of his dead as fuck ancestors was a wee bit shadowhunter (it’d explain a lot, but he isn’t about to tell them that, because he hasn’t lost  _ all _ of his spine), he’s definitely not ready to start ‘discussing family history’ or anything. Not when he cries at night, hands fisting his sheets in nightmares he can’t escape, or when getting out of bed seems like a choice he makes every day. Not when he snarls at everyone who dares to call him Mr. Herondale.

 

There’s a constant in all of the mess, though, and that’s Tiberius.

 

Tiberius has probably saved Kit’s life more times than he can count since he started living at the Institute. He shows up every morning at his bedroom and knocks, as sure as clockwork, at 9:34 am, and walks him to the kitchens, almost as if he’s making sure that Kit gets breakfast every day. He always has his headphones on, but Kit doesn’t really mind, because sometimes,  if he’s really,  _ really _ lucky, Tiberius’s hands brush against his underneath the table, and it makes him dizzy in a way he’s never really been before. 

 

Tiberius sits beside his twin sister, Livvy, in class. In fact, they seem to always be at touching distance, gravitating towards each other like they’re part of the same body. Livvy is probably the second person Kit likes best, because she’s fiery and funny and always seems to be listening when he talks. She’s  _ scary _ with a weapon, though, and Tiberius never fails to smirk when Kit flinches without meaning to when she gets a knife really close to him, even if he’s pretty sure she’d never hurt him. She’s easy to read, like that.

 

There’s patterns, or just little things, that Tiberius follows that make the days predictable (but not unpleasant) even if Shadowhunter life in general seems a little bit wild and impossible to truly fit into a routine. For example, he  _ never _ wears purple or orange, and can’t really look at Kit if he does (Julian, in a turn of events that made everyone wince in sympathy when it was announce, took him shopping the first week. It was awkward and horrible and Kit still can’t look at him in the eyes, because accidentally being seen naked is  _ not _ something he’ll forget anytime soon); he always has his headphones, either on or resting on his lean, pale, perfect ( _ oh, hell _ ) shoulders, and often carries a small black Rubix cube or some pipe cleaners to fidget with, usually when he’s nervous; he likes doing things in order, and snaps when Kit gets frustrated and skips some steps.

 

“You don’t  _ get it _ ,” he hisses, grey eyes blazing, “You don’t do it  _ like that _ .”

 

And so Kit retreats, apologizes, because who’s he to argue? Tiberius is much smarter and capable than he is, anyway. 

 

Sometimes Tiberius doesn’t do anything at all, and just stares at things for hours, in complete silence, arms hugging his knees close to his chest. Some days he doesn’t seem to  _ want _ to do anything, and others he bursts into silent tears, frustrated because he  _ can’t. _ Kit usually brings him his Sherlock Holmes books or his Rubix cube, but Tiberius looks at him like he’s gone mad, so most times he just sits beside him and waits.

 

Because Tiberius’s done the waiting for a long time. He waited when Kit yelled at him because “you’re just a jerk like all the others! I want to go  _ home _ !”, sitting on his front door again, unshakeable, and he waited when Kit decided he’d better be alone and tried to run away, only to come crawling back ten minutes after, to find his friend sitting cross-legged on the Institute’s steps, cocking his head and saying, “Well,  _ that _ was an utter waste of time.” He waited in silence while Kit sobbed into his shoulder, clinging to him on the couch that’s in the library, whispering things like, “The worst thing about my father being gone is that no one cares about it,” or “Sometimes I think that this is all a dream and I’m still there, watching those demons tear him apart.”

 

Life at the Institute  starts to become...life, after some time.

 

He decorates his room, actually does things like put a poster up, gets some earphones, a lamp for his bedside table, takes out the creepy painting and chucks it somewhere else, for the next unfortunate soul who happens to be saddled with it. He chooses the bow as his weapon, after sitting on the floor for hours and chewing his lower lip while staring at every weapon he’s ever done well with, and glows with satisfaction when Julian smiles, proud. Kit gets into the habit of arranging movie nights with the other Blackthorns, always ending up next to Tiberius mysteriously, and Livvy and him have ping-pong tournaments while Dru rolls her eyes. He gets Mark to braid his hair while Emma snorts at the picture he makes, like he’s a hippie, and just grins at them, feeling absolutely comfortable. He makes ‘Perfect Diego’ a contact in his phone.

 

He meets Jace Herondale, and Tessa Gray, and doesn’t talk about it.

 

And that...the fact that he feels at  _ home _ ...that stops being scary, when Julian’s eyes widen in panic the second he gets hurt in the training room, or when Cristina rolls her eyes and criticises his sense of fashion, or maybe even when Tavvy falls asleep while he’s holding him.

 

It probably happens when Tiberius lends him  _ A Study In Scarlet _ , warning him to be careful  _ or else _ .

 

…

 

“Kit,” Tiberius says one day, hesitant. 

 

They’re hanging out at the library, and Kit’s sprawled out on one of the armchairs, pen in his mouth, while Tiberius is sitting on the other, “Do you maybe...would you like to come to town? With me? Just us.”

 

He freezes, heart racing, and almost drops his copy of  _ The Shadowhunter’s Codex _ , which he’s been studying because Diana insists on him catching up to the rest of the Blackthorns, despite the fact that he whines and pleads for it to stop, mouth going dry. Holy  _ shit _ .

 

(That’s probably blasphemy now, he realizes, but eh, who cares.)

 

“Like…” he swallows hard, “Do you mean...on a date?”

 

Tiberius is blushing now, and Kit’s pretty sure he’s never seen that before, what with how composed he always seems to be. It’s a little overwhelming. “Yeah,” the Blackthorn coughed, red to the tip of his ears, “Like a date.”

 

“Yes!” Kit blurts out, sounding overenthusiastic even to himself, but right now he honestly couldn’t care less, not with the way that Tiberius is beaming and burying his head in his Agatha Christie novel, as if to hide the radiance in his face, embarrassed, “Yes, Tiberius, I would be honored,” he tries again, rubbing the back of his neck and looking down at his book as well.

 

The other boy bites his lip, “You should probably call me Ty.” His eyes widen in horror, “You know, if you want to. You don’t have to or anything, it’s not an order-”

 

Kit hasn’t heard Tiberius ( _ Ty _ ) sound like a regular, ‘mundane’ teenager before, and it, terrifyingly, makes him want to kiss him and coo over him. He grins, a little less wildly, “I  _ should _ , and you can call me Christopher, if you want, since we’re dating.”

 

“Dating,” Ty echoes, and there’s no way of hiding his smile now.

 

Over the large, oaken table, their fingers find a way to link themselves together.

 

…

 

They get ice cream, because they’re fifteen and pretty much broke, so a fancy dinner is out of the question (besides: demons), at a normal ice cream shop, with barely-edible cones and a smiling young adult wearing a terribly embarrassing rainbow-colored apron, looking like he’d rather cut his arms off than be there, like tradition mandates.

 

Tiberius ( _ Ty _ )  stares at the thing, puzzled and slightly alarmed, like he’s never seen proper chocolate ice cream before (which, in his case, is probably the case), “This looks terribly unhealthy and bad for our body’s temperature levels, Christopher.”

 

Kit rolls his eyes and licks his vanilla one, smirking  when grey eyes seem to track the movement, and Ty swallows, looking away, “Yeah, but that’s half the fun. Shadowhunters also get to have fun, don’t they?”

 

Ty cocks his head, conceding the point, and gives it a valiant try, but he only manages to get chocolate all over his mouth, looking absolutely adorable (Kit’s got it  _ bad _ ). He shoots a betrayed glance at the cone, like it’s personally offended him.

 

It’s alright, though. Kit’s there to clean it up for him.

 

**fin**

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments are appreciated enormously! Us kitty shippers gotta stay together!!


End file.
